In a small, somewhat unremarkable town named Castus Hollow, something odd is happening…
For decades, people have been appearing in the streets at dawn from apparently nowhere. Before anyone can get to them, they collapse into convulsions, followed by a high fever. Usually only one or two at a time, though occasionally in groups as large as 5 or 6, these newcomers always in unusual clothing that nobody in the town can recognise the make of. When they awaken, they have no memory - not even of their names or ages - but they have grown feathered wings.
Though their appearances have become a routine event, there are whispers of what goes on if you become too close with the Feathers. Whispers that you either catch whatever it is they have, or just vanish forever. Or worse… that whatever lives in the forest will hunt you down and steal you from your very bed.
The town is encircled on all sides by thick, impenetrable forest. Certainly, you could pass through it in theory, but that would mean traversing the woods, which have grown so thick and dark that often it’s like night inside. That’s to say nothing of the beasts that lurk within, creatures who have not so much been seen in person as had their handiwork laid out for the town to see - gashes in the walls that look like knives made them, mere bloody scraps of people’s clothing left behind after attacks, horrifying screeches in the night that echo when the moon is gone from the sky.
So it is better, your dear nurses tell you, to lay low. You’re a Feather now, but it doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Enjoy the simple country existence you could build here. Make some new friends, make some new memories, make a new life for yourself.
Otherwise, you might fast end up dead.
Castus Hollow is an independent RP group hosted on Discord and Tumblr. Set in a quiet town apparently stuck in the late 1800s, players will find themselves trying to unravel the mysteries of the town, and of how they have ended up there in such a strange form in the first place. It ran for a few months in 2017 before being abandoned.
The original Tumblr blog is unavailable, but an archive of it can be found here
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Castus Hollow contains examples of:
- Abandoned Area: The town is shrinking due to the encroaching forest and monsters, so there are many houses to explore and loot on the edge of or just inside the forest.
- Better to Die than Be Killed: After the revelation that the Feathers are usually killed in a short amount of time by monsters (or the further actual revelation that the Feathers usually become monsters), a few NPCs allude to previous Feathers that committed suicide because of this.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Mandy is empathetic, kind, and forgiving almost to a fault, but when someone crosses her personal lines, she's perfectly happy to see them die without a twinge of guilt.
- Body Horror: Oh god, so much. The concept of growing entire limbs worth of wings in the space of a single night aside, the Monsters in the forest have just enough humanoid features blended with their grotesque appearances to drive them right into the Uncanny Valley. Something about the arms being to long and thin, the fingers being clawed and skeletal, their torsos elongated and skin a mottled grey... oh, and the eyes.
- Comforting Comforter: After Victor tries to stay up all night with Avalon, he passes out before morning and wakes up on the couch wrapped in a blanket.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Implied, given the destruction of the houses some groups find, along with at least one skeleton who seemed to have had its limbs torn off.
- The Darkness Gazes Back: Our first glimpse of the beasts is from an abandoned house, looking into the forest edge at sunset. The glowing eyes of hundreds(?) of monsters wait for the sun to fully set.
- The Dog Bites Back: Before coming to Castus Hollow, Mandy pushed her abusive 'best friend' off a cliff after suffering at his hands for years.
- Drink-Based Characterization: Mandy only drinks absinthe, partially to make herself seem refined and artistic.
- Enchanted Forest: The dense forest surrounding the town is growing abnormally fast, encroaching on old houses and swallowing up streets and buildings alike. This would be fine, if it weren't for the monsters that exclusively inhabit the shade of the trees.
- Eyes Do Not Belong There: When we finally see the Monsters, we find that they can see us just as well... from the molten-gold eyes littered all over their bodies.
- Fantastic Racism: A good portion of the town is suspicious of Feathers. Justified, because Feathers attract monsters to the town, putting everyone at risk, and having lead to several deaths in the past.
- Martyr Without a Cause: Avalon has almost zero self-preservation instincts, and constantly tries to take the bullets for his allies.Victor: "Guess what, you fucking idiot, other people care! It matters to other people whether you live or die! You are not disposable! How many more times do you want me to repeat it? What words do you not get!"
- The Nicknamer: Joy only calls people by nicknames.
- Ontological Mystery: The only hints of their past lives that the Feathers had come in the form of the fever dreams they had while growing their wings.
- Waif Prophet: When the Feathers start developing magical abilities, Mandy starts having oblique and cryptic visions of the future. As she mainly seems to see visions of disaster, she hates them.
- Was Once a Man: The Feathers are explicitly stated to not be human any more, having slightly different physiology, enough that medicine needs to be applied differently to them. And, of course, the Ferals were once Feathers, but aren't anymore.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Given that the Feathers are considered a new species now, distrusted or avoided by a fair chunk of the town, the question has to be asked. Also comes up for the monsters the more is learned about them.
- You Can't Go Home Again: All previous Feathers have been killed by monsters before they could leave Castus Hallow. Some people take this as a challenge.
- You Wake Up in a Room: A hospital room, strapped to a hospital bed, before they're ushered out by nurses to meet the other Feathers.
